[caden]

Hello all,
I am a machine designer for a small machine shop in Temple, tx. I have a bridgeport copy, a surface grinder and 2 lathes in my home shop.
I have been playing with converting old military mausers to sporting rifles. I also have my own manual machine little shop at work and mainly run the bridgeport at and do lathe work but very little threading. I do alot of programming on small unitronics PLCs. We do have about 20 CNCs.

I am in the process adding CNC capability to my home bridgeport (on the cheap) but am a real novice. Have been lurking around this site and others .

Finally bit the bullet and yesterday ebayed a 2 axis Glentek GA linear servo amp and a Glentek GA5520 PWM Brushless Servo Amp

Glentek GA5520 PWM Brushless Servo Amp - eBay (item 150533178638 end time Dec-19-10 19:05:19 PST)

Glentek GA6520 Dual Linear Brushless Amplifier - eBay (item 150533176546 end time Dec-19-10 19:00:04 PST)

These were from a dover CNC device.

I would like some information on some freeware, prefer windows based, software to get the feel and then I will upgrade.

Also some really cheap brushless servo motors just to play with.

I am 63 years old and have a pretty good life experience background and a good electrical knowledge, and am fairly computer literate.


Have heard there is a NIST EMC CNC software that will run servo amps but what is the "linux". is it different than windows? Is there a better beginner software? basically I just need to drill hole patterns to begin with (xyz)

what kind of torque do I need (oz-in) just to move the xy axises on a bridgeport?

[awerby]

It's not Windows, it's an open-source project all its own, based on the Unix OS. The NIST people started the project on that OS because of its realtime capabilities, which Windows lacks. The project is now being developed by a loose coalition of programmers at linuxcnc.org. It will keep track of servo feedback loops and close them at the computer, but setting it up is not very easy, especially if you aren't familiar with the operating system.

It's hard to say what it would take to power your Bridgeport. Does it have ballscrews, or is it a manual model? If it's a manual J-head, you might want to keep it intact, and use it to make parts for a conversion of a mill that was built for CNC use. Machines with good iron and ballscrews but bad or obsolete controls come up frequently, often at scrap prices, and would save you a lot of time and money over converting a good manual machine.

Andrew Werby
ComputerSculpture.com — Home Page for Discount Hardware & Software

[caden]

Found out today that a fellow in our shop wrote the software to run our CNCs. Runs mori-seki, okuma excels etc.

He says his communicates thru RS232 and he will help me get up and running.

His program is conversational, it has options for like drilling x number of holes on a bolt circle, you pull up the screen and put in the centerpoint, # of holes, where first hole is in degrees, size of hole etc. It then generates the G-code.

will do peck cycles etc. and has error compensation.

Will try it first.